


Between Breaths

by XialiPrince



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Tim Drake Gets a Hug, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Tim Drake is Not Okay, Tim Drake-centric, TimKon if you squint and you'd better believe i'm short sighted, You've been warned, no beta we die like robins, should i tag this as major character death??? because death is a major character???????, this was written in a sleep deprived haze after binging tim drake angst fics, wait i can tag this with
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 15:42:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29653575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XialiPrince/pseuds/XialiPrince
Summary: Death perches on Tim’s desk, swinging her legs like a child. Tim holds out his hand questioningly, but she shakes her head."Not yet," she says."When, then?" he asks."Soon."
Relationships: Tim Drake & Death, nope that's not a joke - Relationship
Comments: 5
Kudos: 151





	Between Breaths

**Author's Note:**

> Fair warning to all of you, the majority of my DC depth of knowledge comes from youtube and fanfics. That being said, Tim Drake is one of my absolute favourite characters, and I figured I might as well make this fic everyone else's problem since it was just collecting dust in my dropbox. With that said, I hope you enjoy it!

Death perches on Tim’s desk, swinging her legs like a child. Tim holds out his hand questioningly, but she shakes her head.

_Not yet_.

_When, then?_

_Soon._

Tim sighs, leaning back into the plush pillows. A chunk of his hair is missing, the parts around it singed by the misfired bullet from the gun that Batman swatted out of a thug's hand. He can still feel that heat, searing hot as it shot past his scalp. Half an inch down, and Tim would be dead in the corner of the construction site he’d wedged himself into.

Janet and Jake would return to an empty house, the Bats would never know that someone had found out their secret, and the photos hidden in the false bottom of his closet would never see the light of day again. Tim wonders how long it would take for his body to be found.

_Why not now?_

_You aren’t done yet, little one. When the time comes, you will know._

_You’ll be with me, won’t you? You won’t leave me alone?_

_Never, little one._

**xXx**

Red Hood is gone, leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. Tim wheezes desperately as blood pours down his neck from the gaping wound just under his chin. Death sits beside him, strokes his hair as he gasps and gags.

_I’m here, little one._

_Now?_

_No. Not yet._

_Soon?_

_Soon._

Death hums quietly, a familiar lullaby that Tim clings to as he slips into unconsciousness. Her hand stays tangled, soothing, in his hair.

**xXx**

Janet is dead. Jack’s in a coma. Tim sits in the waiting room, where the nurse is supposed to come and pick him up to see his father’s immobile body. Bruce rests a reassuring arm over his shoulders, tries to get Tim to eat or drink something, but Tim can’t bring himself to respond. Instead, he watches Death, ethereal in her moon-white cloak.

She drifts over to him, a sorrowful apology clouding her crimson eyes.

_Why them? Why not me?_

_Their time had come. I had no say in it, little one._

_That doesn’t seem fair._

**_I_ ** _am fair. **Life** is not. _

_Why not?_

Death ruffles his hair, pressing a kiss to his forehead with cool, chapped lips. Bruce looks at Tim’s hair in confusion, probably wondering where the sudden breeze came from. Tim tilts his head at Death, curious and hollow.

She pats his head once more, and does not answer.

**xXx**

Tim convulses on the table, his entire being seizing with agony. Death cradles his head in her crossed legs and sings a wordless melody that filters through his pain. The high, clear song cuts through the ugly sounds of his weak crying, gives him something grounding to hold onto, but Tim’s losing his grip.

_I can’t take any more. Enough._

Alfred dabs at Tim’s sweaty forehead with a blessedly cool cloth. He says something, and Tim’s vaguely aware of his own mouth moving, begging, pleading.

_A bit longer, little one. I know your strength, and you will survive a while longer._

_Soon. Soon._

_Soon, little one, but not yet. Not yet._

Tim goes lax in Death’s feather-light hold. Alfred calls for someone. He can hear the arrhythmic beeps echoing in the cave, slowly regaining their even rhythm. Tim breathes heavily, leaning into Death’s hand when she brushes back his hair.

_Sleep. There are battles still to fight, little one, but you need only rest for now._

**xXx**

Kon’s limp body is heavy in Tim’s arms. Death kneels beside Tim, drawing him close and rocking while he stares blankly at Kon. Tim’s filthy, stained with dirt and sweat and blood, but her cloak is still pristine, bone-white. She drapes it around his shoulders with practiced ease borne of a thousand repetitions.

_Please. I don’t want to be alone._

_Are you sure? Is that what **he** would have you do?_

Tim bows his head, slumping into her embrace. Her bare arms are cold, but he’s so numb that it barely registers.

_No._

_It’s not time, then, is it?_

_You’ll wait, won’t you?_

_As I always have, little one._

Dick has to drag him away from Kon’s body, but Tim doesn’t fight. Just lets himself be moved around, lets himself be stitched up and fed and tucked beneath warm covers, lets himself sleep because it’s the closest he’ll come to reaching Kon until Death lets him go with her.

And later, when Tim pulls on his new Robin suit, black and red for the one that he lost, he catches a glimpse of Death’s serene face in the reflection of his white-out lenses. She’s smiling.

**xXx**

Tim lets the muzzle of the gun press into the dip of his temple, icy metal leeching the heat from his skin. Slowly, cautiously, he moves his index finger to rest the trigger. His mouth is dry when he looks at Death. She tilts her head, eyes warm and kind like the fireplace he used to imagine sitting in front of his parents with, looking at him with such untainted fondness that it feels like he’s coming home.

It strikes him that he’s not sure where home even is, anymore. Not his parents’ manor, with its oppressive silence. It might have been Wayne Manor once, back when Bruce patted Tim’s shoulder after a good night’s work and Dick hugged him with good-natured teasing and Alfred watched over them all with exasperated fondness, but it hasn’t been for a long, long time. The Nest is secure, it’s safe, but it’s never given him that sense of comfort that Wayne Manor used to hold.

The Titans base is hollow. The Team is there, but it’s not right, can’t ever be right again in the way it once was. His friends are there, but they have other homes too. Not like him. 

His room there is clean and tidy and empty, empty, empty.

_Now?_

_If you wish, little one. I will always wait for you._

Tim’s finger tightens on the trigger. Death reaches out, cups his cheek with a delicate hand. He leans into it, the gnawing desperation in his stomach calming with her touch. Tim meets her patient gaze, already knowing what his answer must be.

_I’m so tired._

_I know._

_I can’t do this much longer._

_I know._

_You promise you’ll wait?_

_Always._

The gun slips out of his shaking fingers, bouncing once before lying heavy on his lap. Death brushes away his tears with the pad of her thumb, lightly kissing the spot where the gun was lined up to his head.

_Your time is as you choose, little one. I will be here when it comes._

_Thank you._

_For what?_

**xXx**

Tim pants, squeezing his hand tight over the wound in his abdomen, nearly blacking out from the spike in pain. He can’t rest though – not while Pru is choking on her blood beside him, not when she still has a chance to live, not when he hasn’t saved Bruce yet.

Death twirls her scythe. She blurs in his vision until she’s nothing but a smudge on this expanse of yellow-gold. Tim takes his hand off his wound, reaching out desperately even as blood pours from him and soaks into the sand, staining it all with ugly red. Panic clogs his throat as she shimmers in the heat, wavering like a mirage. 

_Don’t go. Don't leave me here._

_I will not stand for this._

She takes his face in her hands, tilting it up to meet her gaze. Her eyes are like molten sulfur. Acidic, incensed. Filled with the kind of vitriolic fury that he’s only seen on Jason during a fit of Pit-rage.

_I would have you come with me on our own terms. You have not lost yet. Do not fall now, Timothy Wayne._

And hearing her say that name, the name Bruce gave to him… it’s enough.

He grits his teeth. Forces his screaming muscles to bear his and Pru’s weight. Takes stilted step after stilted step. Death keeps an icy hand on his shoulder in silent encouragement, and they continue. Together, as they always have.

**xXx**

Tim blinks up at Dick’s blurry, panicked face, his voice muffled like Tim’s hearing it from underwater. Death smiles down at him. There’s a crystal clarity to her features that he’s never seen before.

_Do you think it’s time to go, little one?_

_Now?_

_Yes._

Tim doesn’t hesitate to take her hand. She wraps her star-white cloak around his shoulders, eyes burning bright like the sunrise. Dick’s cries catch his attention again, and Tim looks back at the way he’s begging Tim’s body to wake up, keeping rhythm with his CPR even as tears spill over his cheeks. It calls to something long forgotten, a twinge of pain deep inside him that remembers train-surfing and laughter and being carried up the stairs, half-asleep, safe in someone else’s hold without the fear of being let go.

He pauses, pulling the cloak tighter around him, trying to find comfort in it the way he used to. It’s not as warm as he remembers.

_Do you think…_

Tim starts, but he can’t find it in himself to finish. It seems rude, at this point, but Death’s smile is lit with something he can’t quite put a word to. It’s been three years since Tim’s really known that face when someone looks at him, but Tim thinks that it might be pride.

_Yes, little one?_

_Could I stay a bit longer?_

Death’s smile breaks into a full grin, and she shines like embers dancing in the night.

_Do you think it’s time to go, little one?_

She repeats her question, and Tim realises that he didn’t actually answer it.

_Not yet._

_Then I’ll wait for you, little one, as I always have. Good luck, Tim._

And with that, she takes back her cloak and lets go of Tim’s hand. There’s a sense of finality when she presses one last kiss to his forehead, steps away and beams as Tim’s vision begins to fade back to Dick’s relieved sobs. Tim knows with absolute certainty that this is the last time he’ll live past a visit from her, but he’s kind of okay with that.

Death will be back at some point. He’ll see her again.

Until then, he thinks as he’s swept into Dick’s secure hold, as he’s rushed to the Cave where Alfred and Leslie waste no time in fixing his broken body, as he talks and cries and fractures in front of them all, as they talk and cry and piece him back together, as he sits content and swamped by love from a family that will never let him go again, until then…

_Until then, he’s going to live._

**Author's Note:**

> It's a bit abstract, but I had fun writing it!  
> As per usual, please leave a comment if you have time, but it's totally fine if not - don't pressure yourself into leaving comments if it makes you uncomfortable!! I appreciate you reading this travesty!  
> Constructive criticism is always appreciated as I'm still developing my writing style. See ya!


End file.
